I do enjoy watching MSNBC when time permits. “The Ed Show” seldom makes a coherent point, but it is caustically entertaining.

Watching Al Sharpton is like the ASPCA commercials without music. If an event smacks of race, he piles on but then vanishes if it proves fraudulent (Duke lacrosse and Tawana Brawley). He champions the rich paying their fair share yet owes $1 million in back taxes and was invited to meet with President Barack Obama on Dec. 4 to discuss middle-class taxes (must have been evasion techniques). You really can’t make this stuff up.

And then there is Melissa Harris Perry. In my opinion she is the breath of fresh air at MSNBC. Her commentary is researched, accurate and to the point. While I seldom agree with her analysis or opinions, I do admire her lack of duplicity and hypocrisy.

On Jan. 10, Perry defended the lack of diversity in Obama’s second-term Cabinet saying one’s skin color and gender “doesn’t mean that they are representative of that specific group.” She cited Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas as an example.

She further said not to “assume that any given physical body carries with it a set of political ideas.” Congresswoman Bachman was cited as an example.

“Thomas and Bachman,” she said, “are not representative of their race and gender since they do not represent the majority of their respective groups.”

In other words, the content of one’s politics trumps gender and ethnicity. A person is only representative if he or she agrees with certain political ideas. I opined as much in a recent article (add Sen. Tim Scott to the list of examples) and apparently twisted some tails. Were the right to say this they would be accurately called racists but when the left says it they are so-called enlightened progressives. If her assertion is correct then the ethnic and gender makeup of our elected officials really makes no difference.

So why all the angst? Curious.

I view her commentary as an anti-diversity diversity statement and an example of liberal intolerance, but at least she had the moxie to say it.